Happy Birthday Nathan!

Nathan turned 4 in January. He is growing up so fast. I am often told he is very well behaved at preschool and in Primary, though when he's with me he climbs all over me and is still pestering his little sister. He is a smart cookie. He knows all the sounds the letters make and tries to sound out words. He sees a store sign that he recognizes and says, "Costco is spelled C-O-S-T-C-O!" or what ever the store happens to be. He is a whiz at the computer, iPhone, and the Wii.

He chose his cake design off Pinterest this year. It was a construction site.

He also got his first set of Legos. We had a fun time building them together, though it was more Audrey's level, but have had less fun trying to keep all the little pieces together on the Cars cars.

He is a very helpful child. He does as I ask him happily and always tries to be the first to get things done. He is very excited to be a big brother again. He wants to call his baby brother "Benny" (from the Boxcar Children books). We'll see.

Family Photo Shoot

We have never done a real photo shoot before, we paid money for it and everything! We had a good time at a beautiful park in Cedar Hills and my friend Colette got some great shots. Here are a few...








I sure have good looking kids, if I do say so myself. =)

A Month in Pictures

It's been one month since I've blogged, let's see what we did...

Curtis and I both Turned 30!


He got me an iphone, so now my boys sit like this all the time:

I got him U2 tickets!

We had an AWESOME time. My mom watched the kids for us. We didn't get home until 1:30am. I think concerts like this are for the young, we were wiped, but had a wonderful time.

We had a big birthday party. We filled our backyard with lots of friends and family. What a way to celebrate 30 years of life! =)



We fixed up all our bikes and Nathan earned a big boy bike! He does really well. In his words, he "rides around and around and around!" The weather has been so cold and wet all month that we have only been able to go on a couple of rides as a family.

We went to the school carnival where they had swings, bouncy houses,
cotton candy and shaved ice.

We discovered a new park in Alpine that has several parks designed to make you throw-up.

And it has a splash pad too. I'm sure we'll be visiting there lots if the weather ever gets warmer.



Though Claire is not quite crawling, she can get ANYWHERE she wants
and often gets stuck under the chairs.


I've started eating better again. I don't think I'll go as crazy as I did before, but I have ballooned since eating like most people do, so I know I just can't live that way.
Green smoothies are back on the menu.


Even Claire loves them and believe it or not Audrey has been requesting them.


I've also started making my own bread and grinding my own wheat. I found a K-Tec Grain Mill on KSL for $15. The whole family loves the bread I make. Audrey says, "Yes! You're making bread again!" The recipe I use is here: http://www.simplehealthytasty.com/2010/09/best-yet-whole-wheat-bread_07.html
Her whole blog is packed with great whole food recipes.
We have also been enjoying Bountiful Baskets.
And the kids love mangoes. I can't cut them quick enough.


I have cute kids and I enjoy being their mom.

Nathan is 3!

This little boy is now 3!
(Oh wait, he's not little, he's big! and he won't let you say it any other way!)

On his actual birthday we used his free pass at Boondocks. He had been looking forward to going for his birthday since we went for Audrey's birthday. He kept asking, "Can we go to Boom Blocks?" He was too little to do most of the free stuff, so we just spent the free coins and got some silly (I mean awesome) little prizes.

When we were searching for images to use in his newly decorated room (images to come) we kept seeing Thomas the Train cakes like these:
and he would say, "I want a cake like that!"

Well, I'm just not that fancy, so he got this instead:

I think it turned out great and he loved it, especially since he got to help decorate it.

We forgot to give him a gift on his birthday, so one Saturday we let him open two, a toy gun and a new bedspread, saving two for the family party on Sunday. We forgot them at home. Good thing he didn't seem to notice (we are such good parents, ha, ha). Luckily grandma got him footsies and Alaura gave him some toy cars.

Happy Birthday Big Boy!

No You Get Out!!!

This is what happens when you have two kids but only one bucket.
I ended up having to hide the bucket to get them to stop.





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Highland Splash Park

We went to the Splash Park in Highland yesterday for Family Home Evening. It was really fun. Nathan was done being splash before Audrey, but we will definitely be going back this summer.

Painting the Fence

I bought fence paint over a year ago, but last summer came to fast and hot. I finally started painting today. We have a big fence and we have to do both sides on three of the lengths around our house. I hope to do a little each day before it gets too hot. Audrey and Nathan are great helpers (for about 10 minutes).

Disneyland!

We had a wonderful time at Disneyland a couple weeks ago.
This was our first time together and with kids. My sister Alaura came with us.
It was so nice to have her help. We spent all day at the park, from 8:30am to 12:00 am.
We wore ourselves out, but we were able to do everything we wanted to in just one day with our Give-a-Day, Get-a-Day Passes.

Nathan had talked about meeting Mickey and shaking his hand for a long time before the trip. He was so excited and proud of himself for actually getting to do it.

Minnie walked right up to us as we were playing in Toon Town.

Audrey loved the big roller coaster type rides, like Splash Mountain and Space Mountain.
We were surprised because she's usually such a scared-y cat.

Buzz Lightyear to the rescue!
The ride broke down while we where on it so we were actually able to walk
right by Buzz as we were escorted out. Nathan was in heaven.

This princess mickey hat is the only souvenir we bought. Nathan really wanted a Buzz Lightyear spinner, but the prices are out of this world. You would think the park would realize that if the prices were lower they would sell more, but I guess we are unusually cheap, we even shared a meal for dinner and packed PB&J for lunch.

The line to meet the princesses was really long and slow. We were almost at the beginning when the kids started crying and saying they didn't want to meet them anymore.
I stuck it out and they were both glad to meet them.

We really wore Nathan out. He fell asleep in our arms at about 9:30pm and only woke up for the Pooh Ride, which we went on twice while Curtis and Alaura rode Indiana Jones.

Our hotel room was ok, a cheap Days Inn within walking distance
from the park that we got for free using our credit card points.
It had an extra room with a 3rd queen size bed and an additional full bath,
but the pool was freezing, the "hot tub" was cold and green and the towels were like sand paper.
We were all a little disappointed since we were really looking forward to swimming. Next time I will read customer reviews before a book a hotel.

Curtis made a matching game with more pic and details. You can play it here: http://matchthememory.com/gibbydisneyland